Chapter 97
Serena
My phone rang before my eyes were open.
I reached for it; Mark’s name sat on the screen. I answered, pressed the phone against my ear.
“Mrs. Thawthorne, the Alpha would like to speak with you,” Mark said. “He’s asking you to come to the house.”
“No,” I said.
“It’s regarding the divorce.”
My blood heated; my fingers tightened around the phone, my jaw locked. The audacity of this man to summon me to his house, to send his assistant on a morning I did not ask for, to dangle the word divorce in front of me and expect me to come running.
I told Mark I would call him back, hung up, dialed Kieran. 1/10
He answered on the second ring
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“What the fuck is happening?” I sat up in bed; my belly pressed against my thighs. “Why am I coming to your house for a divorce conversation?”
“I’m handling some work matters, I can’t leave the house right now.” His voice was calm; the apology in it was measured, deliberate. “My lawyer will be on video call. I’ve been too busy to go anywhere, so I’m asking you to come with your own lawyer. We can meet here, talk about the divorce.”
“You expect me to come to you.”
“I’m sorry.” He paused. “I know you don’t want to do this, but it’s the only option. If we don’t meet today, it’ll be postponed by a month or two.”
A month or two. I did not want another month married to this man; I did not want another week, another day, another hour with his name chained to mine while my belly grew, while my freedom shrank.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll come.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
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I hung up, threw the covers off, got dressed in under ten minutes. The divorce papers sat in the folder on my desk; I grabbed them, held them against my chest. These pages were my ticket out, my exit, the key to a door I clawed at for months. I texted my lawyer the address; he replied that he would meet me there. Today was the day this marriage died.
I told my parents I was leaving. My mother held my arm, searched my face, asked me if I was sure. I told her the divorce was happening today; I would be back before
evening.
When I stepped outside, Mark stood by a black car with the rear door open; his hands were clasped behind his back, his posture formal.
“The Alpha didn’t want you to trouble yourself,” Mark said. “He asked me to bring you, given your condition.”
My stomach turned. I did not want to ride in Kieran’s car, did not want his driver, did not want his courtesy wrapped around me, tightening with every mile.
But the ride would save me time, energy, money. If Kieran wanted to pay for the car that carried me to the2:50 end of his marriage, I would let him.
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“Fine,” I said, then I got in.
I walked into the house, found Kieran in his study.
No suit, no tie, no polished shoes. He wore grey sweatpants, a tank top that clung to his shoulders,
showed every line of muscle beneath the fabric. His hair was scattered across his forehead; a pair of glasses sat on the bridge of his nose.
My breath caught.
Those glasses. I did not see them in years.
I could remember when I was younger, maybe twenty-two; I walked into his office, saw the glasses for the first time, my entire body went warm. I told him we should have sex with the glasses on. He laughed, told me it was a silly idea. But he gave in; the glasses stayed on, one of the best nights we ever shared. The memory of it still lived in my skin, my thighs, my spine.
My face flushed; the heat climbed up my neck, spread across my cheeks. I pressed my teeth together, shoved the memory down. His tall frame, his jaw, his lips, the way the tank top sat against his chest; none of it helped, but !
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did not come here for this.
“Join me in the study,” he said.
I walked in, sat across from him. The desk between us was covered in papers, files; the laptop sat open to his right.
“We’ll wait for your lawyer,” he said. “Do you need anything? The housekeeper made tea, I can heat some up for you.”
“Fine,” I said. “I can’t have coffee anyway.”
He came back with a cup of tea, set it on the desk in front of me. The porcelain was warm under my fingers; the tea was sweet, light. I drank half of it in three sips.
He sat back down, opened a file on his desk.
“Why did you keep the pregnancy a secret from me?” he asked; his voice was quiet, his eyes stayed on the file. The calm in his tone caught me off guard; I expected anger, accusation, rage. Not this. Not a man who sat behind a desk and asked the question the way he asked about the Weather.
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“Why are you curious about another man’s child?”
He dropped his gaze. “Why can you not stop saying that nonsense?”
“You heard me, the child is not yours.” I held his gaze.
His face suddenly darkened, all traces of a laugh wiped out. “I know that child is mine.”
“I don’t know what you want me to say, I have told you the baby isn’t yours, why do you keep trying to delude yourself?”
“I do not believe you,” he said, his face still dark.
“It’s too late for that.” I picked up the tea, drank. “I am happy you agreed to the divorce, I can finally go be with the father of this baby.”
A yawn pressed up through my chest; my jaw stretched wide, my eyes watered. I blinked against the heaviness that crept behind my eyelids.
I looked at the tea.
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“Did you put something in this?” I asked.
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“No.” He did not look up from his papers. “I didn’t put anything in the tea.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Same way I don’t believe you.” His voice was even. He was shockingly calm, this was not the reaction I expected from him. “You can relax, there is nothing in the tea.”
“And I will find out if that baby is mine or not.” He said darkly, his eyes placed on his documents.
“How?”
“You’re gonna see.”
I did not want to see. Kieran was a crazy man, whatever plan he had would be as psychotic as he was.
“I don’t know what you plan to d….” I yawned again. A strange feeling of fatigue washing over me.
He lifted his eyes and caught mine. A smirk played on his lips.
He turned a page. His pen moved across the paper. 12:51
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I watched him.
My eyes suddenly became heavy. “Kieran!” I said weakly.
Then everything went dark.
I opened my eyes to a somewhat familiar ceiling.
This was our bedroom. Even in the new house, he decorated it the same way; the same layout, the same colors, the same curtains, the same bedframe.
I moved to push myself up; my wrists pulled tight. My arms stopped short, the fabric around my wrists held me in place. My hands were tied to the edges of the bed.
My heart slammed against my ribs; panic shot through my veins. I pulled hard; the bindings did not give.
“Kieran!” My voice cracked through the room. “What is happening?”
He sat in the chair beside the bed. His glasses were gone, his arms folded across his chest, his eyes on me.
“I didn’t poison you,” he said. “I gave you a cup of tea;2:51
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your body did the rest. You’re pregnant, stressed, exhausted. Your body shut down because it needed to.”
“Let me go.” I pulled against the bindings; the fabric bit into my wrists, my pulse hammered behind my eyes. “Untie me right now.”
“No.”
His expression was eerily dark especially with his eyes on
“You see, I never planned to divorce you,” he said; his voice was low, steady, stripped of apology. “Learning about the pregnancy means I’m not going to divorce you. If you thought this was going to happen today, it’s not.”
“You lied to me.” My voice shook; rage twisted with fear inside my chest, pressed upward. “You brought me here under false pretenses. You deceived me.”
“I didn’t deceive you because I wanted to.” He leaned forward; his elbows rested on his knees, his hands. clasped together. “But we are husband and wife. We are going to find a way to sort out our differences.” His eyes held mine; they did not blink. “One thing is certain, Lam2 not going to divorce you and I will prove I’m the father of
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